27 



One of the curious examples of vegetable wax is yielded by a palm of 

 this division — Humboldt's Wax Palm, which exudes large quantities of a 

 whitish wax from the upper part of its stem — is the Ceroxylon Andicola. 



Desmoncus Maceoacanthus is the palm from which the Brazilians 

 make their curiously -ingenious elastic mandioca squeezers, or " tipitis ;" 

 they are made from long strips of the outside of the stem. 



The African genus Elais (Jacquiu) closes the list of the division 

 Cocoinse, and it is unsurpassed in value by any of tlie Palmaceae. 



Elais Ouineensis yields the valuable palm oil of commerce, one of the 

 staple imports of Liverpool. The fruit is borne upon an immense 

 tliryse-like spadix, each drupe is pear-shaped and somewhat less than a 

 walnut, having a soft pulpy mesocarp of a bright orange colour, from 

 which the oil is yielded abundantly when the fruit is exposed* (after 

 gathering in heaps) to the sun in the manner employed by the olive 

 growers. 



It is quite startling if we begin to think of the vast extent to which 

 this tree must be yielded naturally or cultivated, for each tree does not 

 yield more than ten pounds of oil at the utmost, and the quantity 

 annually imported into England alone is now nearly thirty thousand 

 tons, which would require six millions, seven hundred and twenty 

 thousand trees ; but it is probable that several crops are yielded in one 

 year. We must on the other hand bear in mind that other countries 

 are large importers as well as ourselves, and in Africa it is also largely 

 used as food by the natives. 



The hard albuminous kernels have also been found to yield an 

 excellent oil, a limpid fluid when first expressed, but soon becoming a 

 hard vegetable fat requiring a knife to cut it. 



The palm oil yields by distillation with acid a valuable material 

 called Palmitic Acid, (the stearic acid of this vegetable butter) and this 

 mixed with the neutral fat (steariue) of the cocoa nut is found to form 

 the best known composition for candles, and is, in fact, t'le material 

 of Price and Co.'s candles, which have won a world-wide celebrity. 

 (The series exhibited shows every result of the manufacture.) Palm 

 oil is not only used for candles, but is quite as extensively used in the 

 manufacture of soap ; it also constitutes a large portion of the grease 

 composition used for the a.xles of railway carriages. 



DIVISION VI.— BORASSIN.^. 

 Two Brazilian genera belonging to this division, Geonoma (Willd.) 

 and Manicaria (Grcrtner), contain species the leaves of which are much 

 used for thatching, and the larger spathes of Manicaria saccifera are 

 usfrl for .'I variety of purposes, as caps, wrappers, liaskets, &c. 



